The Amazing LeBronathon, enabled by the flex of ESPN’s worldwide hype machine, milked 27 minutes and two full commercial breaks of a prime hour of our summer’s leisure on Thursday night before announcing something that should have taken less than 140 characters on a Twitter post.

Jim Gray, we ask you as we sit on “pins and needles”: What’s wrong with this picture?

New-age ethics, protocol, narcissism, arrogance, ego, control freakishness, grandstanding and creating a situation where your own reporters have to work against your own pimping aside, the reality show that evolved into “Dancing With LeBron” finally reached a stinky climax. Stephen A. Smith’s wildest dream came true, having been one of the first to “report” it as “fact” June 28, despite James telling Gray that he just made up his mind Thursday morning to abandon Cleveland for Miami.

Erin Andrews was suspiciously absent from the announcement, leaving Chris Broussard, Shelley Smith, Bob Holtzman, George Smith, Rachel Nichols and anyone else left on the set with Stuart Scott to wildly speculate on what amounted to an unprecedented informercial that made Tiger Woods’ recently televised public apology look amateurish.

The prevalent argument was that if ESPN didn’t pre-empt its regularly scheduled programming with this one-hour special negotiated by James’ camp, then someone else would have snatched it up. Sorry, but ESPN didn’t have the guts to turn it down. That leaves everyone else innocent by ESPN’s guilty pleasure.

Booyahs all around.

If you helped boost the ratings with train-wreck interest as ESPN did a Photoshopped montage of all the different uniforms LeBron James could be wearing – minus one from the Clippers – consider yourself duped.

Actually, there are many disturbing elements to this. But the undercutting issue we’d have most if we were employed by ESPN right now: Who’s on our team right now?

The network’s cockeyed coverage went full bore earlier this summer, butting into the actual games played during the NBA Finals. Yet the biggest hint that there was a horrible conflict of interest came on Tuesday night, when an ESPN “SportsCenter” scroll said that Broussard’s “independent sources” were telling him that this ESPN special was all set to happen.

ESPN, however, wouldn’t even back up Broussard on that. The scroll continued: “ESPN would confirm only that discussions for a LeBron James special are ongoing.”

So now ESPN was referring to itself in the third person on its own network, just like James eventually did during the program as he was shown video of someone burning one of his Cleveland jerseys?

Geraldo Rivera couldn’t bring any more insanity to this.

By Thursday, ESPN’s gaggle of reporters was put into a ridiculous position to try to scoop its own network announcement show. How quaint.

It started early at daybreak in a “Breaking News” scroll where “sources say all indications point to LeBron James signing with Miami,” according to Broussard.

He was on SportsCenter by 8 a.m. saying that “I’m expecting the answer to be Miami, but to sit here and say it’s 100 percent done would be folly.”

Why stop now?

The truth is, how does anyone believe anything else ESPN reports about James from this point forward? Our trust has been violated in typical ESPN cannibalization fashion, leading us closer to the prediction that journalistic perdition isn’t far down the road.

Interestingly, ESPN’s attempt to fill the 24/7 before the announcement actually explored the possibility that James might be taking the right tact in doing things this way – but not that it was at all part of the process.

On Wednesday’s ESPNews, just an hour after the elements of the “The Decision” show was announced, a Cleveland sports talk host named Aaron Goldhammer came on to discuss how crushed the city of Cleveland would be if James snubbed them on national TV – which is what happened.

“This will be taught in journalism and public relations classes 50 years from now about what not to do,” Goldhammer said.

Jim Gray could teach it. He somehow continues to believe he’s a conduit to important news, having been shoved into this situation before as a sideline (Pete Rose) and ringside (Mike Tyson) microphone holder in previous situations. This time, however, Gray has admitted he brought the spotlight to himself. By begging.

In an interview with KSPN-AM on Wednesday, Gray said he approached James and handler Maverick Carter a month ago during Game 2 of the NBA Finals at Staples Center and asked them if he could be part of James’ announcement “and they agreed.”

The joke continues to be on the wimpish Gray, a tool of choice by athletes who want their message delivered filter-free. Somehow, he’s still na ve enough to think his fraudulent career is one crafted by trustworthiness.

Tom Hoffarth is a freelancer. He had been with the Daily News/Southern California News Group since 1992 as a general assignment sports reporter, columnist and specialist in the sports media. He has been honored by the Associated Press for sports columnists and honored by the Southern California Sports Broadcasters Association for his career work. His favorite sportscaster of all time: Vin Scully, for professional and personal reasons. He considers watching Zenyatta win the Breeders' Cup 2009 Classic to be the most memorable sporting event he has covered in his career. Go figure that.